Hitler rose to power.
Along with him, fortuitous and insightful folks took advantage of his rise, tied, but not too closely, their futures to his immediate German successes, and made real differences in their own fortunes by doing so.
#bidenboostfromnazipublisher
A case in point would be #GeorgvonHolzbrinck, who, prior to seeing the advantages of servicing the publication needs of the #ThirdReich, scrabbled for a living selling books door to door.
But not one to miss the opportunity that supporting Nazism at home presented him, he built a publishing empire that has stood the test of time better than the Third Reich that funded the rise of his publication house.
Now, you probably shouldn't even know who von Holzbrinck was. Lord knows, I didn't.
But then, a curious occurrence fired up my interest.
You see, yesterday's news breathless pronounced that #ScientificAmerican had, for the first time in its 150 year publication history, endorsed a presidential candidate, to-wit, @JoeBiden.
So, buoyed by curiosity, I began with the webpage for a magazine that used to come to our house as a kid, a magazine that, by memory, constituted a kind of high brow Popular Science.
But when I navigated the @SciAm website, I discovered that I'd have to direct my browser to a publishing house called Springer Nature to get the whole picture. Springer Nature publishes Scientific American, Nature, and other science and medicine publications.
In turn, Springer Nature is owned and controlled by the Holtzbrinck Publishing Group, which was founded, in turn, by former Nazi Youth member, former door to door book salesman, former publisher of reading material for Hitler's Third Reich, Georg von Holtzbrinck
Not only did dear old Nazi Georg benefit by being a publisher for the Nazis, but he also benefitted further by his easy access to PAPER in the aftermath of the war, which positioned his enterprises to print when others couldn't.
And, because many of the publishing houses in Germany predating the rise of Hitler were owned and operated by Jews, much of his natural base of competition either fled Germany before it was too late or disappeared in the Holocaust.
Nazi facilitator endorses Joe Biden?
Well, maybe we'll agree to disagree on the extent to which post-war recriminations should have resulted in the absolute destruction of businesses that were built with the money of Nazis and the blood of Jews.
But when you tell me that Joe Biden got the Scientific American endorsement, all I hear is that Joe Biden pleases the Nazis.
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